Stephen Minger, stem cell biologist at King's College, London, said
Blade Runner was the best he had seen.

"It was so far ahead of its
time and the whole premise of the story - what is it to be human and who are we,
where we come from? It's the age old questions," he said.

Stanley Kubrick's
epic, 2001: A Space Odyssey, came a very close second in the vote,
followed by the first two films of the Star Wars trilogy, Star Wars and The
Empire Strikes Back, directed by George Lucas.

The other films that made
it into the top 10 were: Alien; Solaris (1972); Terminator;
Terminator 2: Judgement Day; The Day the Earth Stood Still; War of the Worlds;
The Matrix; and Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

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The panel
of scientists were also asked to vote for their favourite authors, and Isaac
Asimov topped the list for his novel I, Robot - which has just been
made into a film starring Will Smith - and the Foundation
Trilogy.

John Wyndham, author of Day of the Triffids and
Chocky, came second. Fred Hoyle came third for The Black
Cloud.